Why is Hope a good quality? (page 4)

Double Edge

Great post JGNat, and WELCOME to the board!

gravedancer

Hate to splice words here...but I feel I have to ask an obvious (to me anyway) question:

Is hope a QUALITY?
Or is it a mental state?
Is it a reliance on something unprovable?

Before I can agree that it is a good quality I need to understand the question. Too often (IMO) people think HOPE is a QUALITY....

Do I think HOPE is a good "thing"? That all depends....the goodness is relative to me finding out that it is a VAIN HOPE? Some have false or vain hopes and it enables them to get through tough times....and endure till the end of their lives.

Shattered hope on the other hand (false hope that one finds out is false) can be very damaging.

jgnat

gravedancer, I like your clarity of thought. I think my hope is a mental state. My hope can be threatened by tragic circumstance. I can temporarily lose hope, and gain it back. As a parent I hope for the best for my children. But what if my son turns out to have a chronic illness that will impair him for the rest of his adult life? There goes the hope for college, grandchildren.

I chose to hope because it is a better way to live. Otherwise I would sink in to despair. Does that mean I hope for the same things for my son? No. I have had to reevaluate what truly makes a beautiful life, and hope that my son will contribute in his own, unique way.

Reliance on something unprovable, to me, is more like faith. (The substance of things not seen). Shattered faith, like shattered hope, is a terrible thing. I watched a single parent cling to her Faith like a drowning woman for over 10 years. If she were spiritual and faithful, celibate and true, God would reward her and her daughter, and restore her husband to her.

Her husband never came back.

Faith shattered, she left her Faith and never came back. But what was her faith in? A single misread promise? Over time, perhaps faith also must be tempered by reality, or else be crushed.

gravedancer

Good post, jgnat.

I totally agree that hope is a GOOD thing. As I wrote even a false hope that nevers fails (by PROVING false) is better than NO hope.

Lack of hope is one of the issues I have to deal with at the current stage in my life. To be honest I preferred having a hope in the Paradise and the Resurrection than the lack of hope I experience. I would rather live believeing totally in that false hope (until such time as I died) than live with the concept that if one of my kids died that it is the END and its all over with NO hope of seeing them again.

This is one of the reasons why I have not tried to convince my parents that the dubs are all wet. They are in their twiglight years....why destroy their hope? That is a worse alternative than being right.

This is just my opinion and I am of course mentally unbalanced, crazy and over-sensitive.

GD

Bleep

I know that the Watchtower provides me hope.

How do you find hope? I am asking all you ex-jws. Without the hope of everlasting life everything is vanity in Gods creation. Soon all will know who Jehovah is once more. Math 24:14 states that "This good news will be preached to all and then the end will come."

Where else can you find one orginization that studies the same thing around the globe at the same time? If you go to another religion they will have some other thing to say than the same religion in another town. Jehovah made it possible to have unity on a wicked earth.

If I had no direction I would be lost and trying to make people feel bad about religion as well. It is so true that young people have less concern about the need for spiritial things.

So much to learn about Jehovah and some people want to turn away so they can do whatever they please I suppose.

larc

Bleep, It is real nice that they say the same thing all at once, all over the globe. Unfortunately, what they are saying is wrong. The end will not come in my life time or yours.

GentlyFeral

I know that the Watchtower provides me hope.

I have to confess that I joined the Watchtower because, at 17, I was an essentially hopeless person. The war in Vietnam was still raging; I had long been aware of the racism in American society; learning about environmental degradation hit me very hard. And then there was the threat of nuclear war that popped into the public consciousness from time to time. So, yeah, I really needed to hear that "the meek shall inherit the earth."

How do you find hope? I am asking all you ex-jws.

Much to my surprise, I'm finding that hope is the default setting -- the state of mind I'm in whenever life doesn't absolutely suck.

Without the hope of everlasting life everything is vanity in Gods creation.

I don't believe it. Mortality actually makes everything more precious -- even if there is an afterlife, our time here on earth is (probably) limited. As COMF would say:

Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring
The Winter Garment of Repentance fling:
The Bird of Time has but a little way
To fly---and Lo! the Bird is on the Wing.

That's from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.

Where else can you find one orginization that studies the same thing around the globe at the same time? If you go to another religion they will have some other thing to say than the same religion in another town. Jehovah made it possible to have unity on a wicked earth.

This is uniformity, not unity. Two churches of the same religion can preach different things on the same day and still "be there" for each other in times of need. The UU church I attended was much different in "flavor" from the other UU churches nearby, but we marched in the Gay Pride Parade together, contributed to each other, and organized conferences together. I believe in religious "biodiversity."

If I had no direction I would be lost and trying to make people feel bad about religion as well. It is so true that young people have less concern about the need for spiritial things.

Then why is Paganism the fastest-growing religion in the English-speaking world? And why is the US the most religious country in the Western world? It all depends on how you define "spiritual things." Anything that breaks down the barriers between people and between people and nature -- that is spiritual. Love is spiritual. Art is spiritual. I am studying a religion in which spirituality also includes most forms of sex.

And I wouldn't take young people to task for their lack of "concern." The body ripens, it fascinates, why not see what it can do? Not just the groin either, but from head to toe.

So much to learn about Jehovah and some people want to turn away so they can do whatever they please I suppose.

But perhaps that is exactly what the Creator intended. As Emerson said, "Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string." I really do think the Creator wants variety.

gently feral

outoftheorg

HOPE-FAITH-TRUST ME- AND I AM A CHRISTIAN! loudly proclaimed, always clicks the "lets be cautious here" switch. It is my experience with jw's and others that this can be their beginning attempt to put something over on me.Especially the I am a christian thing anounced loudly the first time you meet someone usually means they won't behave like one.

HOPE for the best and prepare for the worst is good advice. Of course we all have hope.

You must have faith in wbts as Gods sole source of the truth. Several failed prophecies and their hateful policies and I experienced the worst.

Trust us we are christians, In fact christ and the holy spirit works through us and only us. I experienced very unchristian not christ like actions from the wbts.

I really hope I don't waste my time replying to any more of your posts.

jgnat

So let me get this straight, Bleep. You believe the Watchtower provides you hope. What, personally, are you hoping for?

Do you believe that all who leave the organization are also leaving their hope for eternal life and a paradise earth? It might surprise you that not everyone who leaves lose their hope. But they do not pin their hopes in a single organization.

What exactly sets members of the WTS so superior to all other Christians? Uniformity?

Not a very meek attitude. I think that negates your opportunity for inheritance.

Bleep

Once again I see someone trying to ask a question and then assume that I am not meek. At least give me a chance to explain before assumptions and accusations are made.

I see the Orginization as a religion. The Orginization provides orginization to the religion which is all backed up by the Bible.

It is good to be rightious by having the standards that are set up by Jehovah (The God that inspired the scriptures to be written). Of course men had to do the physical writting for Jehovah. So maybe Jehovah wants to inspire an orginization set up by Jesus?

I hope I never see people come to an understanding that being rightious is the way to go.

And to those who still think there are a heaven or hell when you die (trinity). What happened to all those people who died before Jesus was sacrificed? They were in a void of some kind? Or did they go hell (which is not hellfire) but only the common grave.

Im sure they are asleep still; waiting for the end of this system to shortly pass away.

Why is Hope a good quality?

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